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	<< Back "DAWN" Newsletter of The DAWN CENTER Why Isn't the Pill a Topic of Conversation among Japanese Women? The ban on birth control pills in Japan was finally ended by the government last June. Although the pill has been widely used by about 90 million women around the world for more than 30 years and it has now become available here, many Japanese women don't seem to be so interested in it. Why? Yoshie Kawakita, a feminist counselor at the Dawn Center and Sumie Uno, a women's health activist talked about this. Do women really worry about side effects? Uno: According to a public opinion poll about National Family Planning conducted by the Mainichi Newspaper Population Research Group in 1998, only seven percent of (married) women want to use the pill, and 54 percent of women don't want to use it. In all, 35 percent of women answered that they don't know if they want to or not. The 70 percent of women who answered that they don't want to use it say that the reason is the side effects. Kawakita: I wonder if they really worry about the side effects. Japanese people seem to like taking drugs for colds or stomach problems in their daily lives. They might just be using the idea of side effects as an excuse for not being serious about contraception and the pill. Or do they truly have negative feelings about synthetic hormones? Uno: I'm not sure if they don't want to use the pill because it is a synthetic hormone or not. However, over-the-counter drugs which you take occasionally, such as cold medicine, are basically different from contraceptive pills, which you take everyday even though you are healthy. I personally don't really want to put unnecessary chemicals into my body. But I also understand that we should not argue against the pill merely because it is a chemical. Otherwise, you might have to refuse the pill because it is an endocrine disrupter, which can damage the environment, and might effect future generations. That idea is far away from protection of women's reproductive rights. Kawakita: Yes, there are many reasons why you might choose to take it or not; but in order to choose the pill must be available in the first place. The problem is that there is not enough information about that the pill so that it can be one of the available contraception choices. The mass media has examined and explained the use of Viagra (an anti-impotence drug), but the pill has been ignored. There is not enough public information about how to use the pill with minimum side effects, for instance. Uno: The fact is that even now people don't actually choose one contraceptive or another, so they don't really understand or appreciate that they should be glad about the expansion of contraceptive choices. The Ministry of Health and Welfare should also publish more information about oral contraceptives, such as their safety, risks, the results of tests conducted in Japan, and the actual state of the few hundred thousand women who have taken mid-and high-dosage pills as contraceptives. We often hear that the pill is safe because so many women have been using it in other countries, but also we hear that Marvelon, one brand of the pill which is going to be available here, has been banned in Norway because of a possible increase in the risk of nonfatal blood clots. Do Japanese women who prefer condoms depend on men? Kawakita: A man has to be willing to use a condom, but both a man and a woman can decide if they want to use it or not. The problem is having sex within a relationship which doesn't allow talking about birth control. There are many women who don't feel free to ask the man to use a condom or who are afraid of forcing men to use one. They try not to think about the risk of pregnancy. It seems a woman might evade her responsibility by being dependent. Uno: We often hear that the condoms are not so effective, and there are many abortions because of the failure of condoms, and that's why we should use the pill. Couples, however, actually don't always use condoms. They sometimes use them, and sometimes don't. I don't think that the ineffectiveness of condoms is the only problem. Japanese men are also praised because they don't mind using condoms. But, many men don't really want to use them, and the withdrawal method is very often used instead. We have to think about relationships where women feel sorry for their men having to use condoms, or where they are unable to ask the men to use them. Kawakita: Linear sex, as I call it, is so very common. It starts with a man's desire or a man's erection, and ends with the man's ejaculation. It's not made by the couple's mutual consent, as women are often considered to be passive about sex. It cannot be possible for a couple to enjoy such sex. Such a situation is far from the concept of woman's sexual rights. Aren't Japanese women serious about contraception? Kawakita: I don't think that they are not serious about it. However, taking responsibility for contraception may be beyond their consideration. They don't think that being pregnant or not being pregnant is a matter which they can control. In Japanese culture, the idea that you can control your own fertility is not encouraged. If you get pregnant unexpectedly, you think you are unlucky and start thinking about whether you should have an abortion or not. Uno: That's exactly the concept of the reproductive rights. You actually cannot completely control if you are going to get pregnant or not, but you can try. We are not really taught that you can decide if you want to have a baby or not, or what kind of relationship you want to have with your partner. It is partly a consequence of the lack of women's education and the lack of a true women's movement. We women were not taught that we could control our sexual lives or even our own lives. When seeking government approval of the pill, proponents merely insisted that the pill is safe and effective, and that it even has beneficial effects such as protecting against ovarian cancer. They didn't tell women the most important message, which is about woman's sexual rights. The social aspects of the pill today are not the same as the ones in the seventies, which were directly related to women's liberation. Kawakita: Well, in the birth control movement early in this century, contraception was concerned with the context of a better life for women, but not considered as an aspect of their human rights in their sexual relationships with men. It's taboo, in a way, to talk about equality, self-determination or human rights in intimate relations. That is the root of the gender issue. So far, Japanese women have not been committed positively to the pill issue as an issue of self-determination. Although few women are very interested in the pill, it's actually a fundamental gender issue. Since feminism is being accepted in society these days, compared to before, this is the chance for us to raise our consciousness about issues relating to our bodies and our intimate relationships, including contraception. Page Top Copyright (C) DawnCenter. All Rights Reserved.